


Close To My Chest

by ThereIsNoTragedyInThat



Series: Spirits and Cocaine [23]
Category: Narcos (TV)
Genre: Communication Failure, Fluff and Angst, Idiots in Love, Javier Peña needs a hug, Love Letters, M/M, Nightmares, One Shot, Pining, Short & Sweet, listen everyone is just tired
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 00:22:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29833182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThereIsNoTragedyInThat/pseuds/ThereIsNoTragedyInThat
Summary: Javier didn't quite know where they stood after this.
Relationships: Steve Murphy/Javier Peña
Series: Spirits and Cocaine [23]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2100027
Comments: 9
Kudos: 23





	Close To My Chest

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Handwritten note

Javier stood in the doorway of his bedroom, leaning against the frame and staring at his partner’s sleeping body. In the dim light, he could barely make out the shape of him from the blanket, curled around his waist and impossibly tangled in such a short time. He was laying on his stomach, the light of the streetlamps straining past the blinds to send shards of shadows across the wide expanse of skin and muscle. His face was half buried in Javier’s pillow, one arm stretched across the empty space next to him, almost like he was searching for something, someone to fill it.

In his chest, Javier felt his heart flutter, a strange mix of yearning and anxiety settling over him as he continued to stare. It should be the easiest thing in the world to climb into his own bed and pull Steve close, knew the man would bury his face in his throat, would probably mumble something vaguely insulting in his sleep, would latch on like a man coming home.

Tonight, was the first time they’d had sex but definitely not the first time they’d slept together. Not that they talked about it, about them.

The problem, Javier knew, was that he was a greedy man. From the day he’d met Steve Murphy, took his hand in a firm handshake and looked into eyes that were too hopeful for the harshness of Colombia, he was lost to him. He’d been told, more times than he cared to remember, that he was a romantic…a man who fell easily into love, real love, but rarely got to keep it.

Still, he had never expected Murphy to surprise him.

Never expected to be wanted.

Tearing his eyes away from Steve’s sleeping form, Javi slipped away, bare feet padding quietly across his tiled floors and into his living room. He was naked and his body a bit sore, yet he couldn’t bring himself to cover up the marks scattered across his body. He liked looking down and seeing the redness of his thighs from Steve’s mustache, the little bite marks on his chest, the half-moons already disappearing where he dug his nails in.

Reaching for his pack of cigarettes, open and enticing on his coffee table, it was a small relief to focus his energy on the simple task of flicking his lighter, inhaling the nicotine, filling his lungs and then exhaling on a world-weary sigh.

It hadn’t been hard to figure out that Steve liked him, felt some kind of physical attraction. It was obvious, a dance he’d watched play out a thousand times, yet rarely so dire, rarely with his heart on the line. The man was touchy to begin with, always seemed ready with a hand on his shoulder, his arm, even his head…but as time dragged on and Javi watched his marriage implode in slow motion, those simple, innocent touches began to linger.

His eyes too, were a dead giveaway. Steve wasn’t the kind to hide behind a mask, would be terrible at poker or bluffing, wore everything in his face for better or for worse. Javier could only take so many of those long gazes, that considering expression, found himself sucked into the man’s orbit no matter how hard he tried to pull away.

Javier was a greedy man.

He knew Steve better then he knew himself, was there when he woke up screaming from nightmares, a litany of names on his lips, tumbling from his frantic tongue, hands reaching for a gun that was safely in the other room. Had held him through nights when he woke up to find only the emptiness of his bed, of losing Connie mixed with the bottle, overwhelming him.

Tried not to succumb to the agony of watching him live through the pain of losing his partner, Kevin’s name being whimpered into the night over and over again, ready to wake him the moment he was sure it wouldn’t get better.

Drowned himself in guilt and shame when Connie and Kevin slowly turned into his own name, his cries on the edge of desperate, hands grasping for him in the night. Javier never said anything those times, kept his lips pressed firmly closed and let him reach over in the bed they’d come to share and feel his heartbeat through his shirt.

He knew him better then he knew himself, but Javier didn’t know what tonight meant to them. The tension of their relationship, the intimacy and trust had been slowly evolving while they both worked twice as hard to ignore it.

Tonight, had been inevitable.

Except Javier didn’t know if he could survive this being anything less then love.

Sometimes, it was like he felt too much.

It had felt like love, in the moment; tender and sweet and fumbling. Steve’s hands had felt like a caress, even when they gripped him tightly, his lips tasted like home and his voice, so soft and quiet, felt like a promise just for the two of him.

He supposed he _was_ a romantic.

Javier felt his eyes begin to sting, an ache settling into his bones in a way that made him feel impossibly old, each beat of his heart like a muscle worn thin and trying too hard. He loved Steve, more than he knew how to handle, found a nervous, needy energy spreading throughout his limbs and he was suddenly overwhelmed with the urge to just, get it out.

A voice, feminine and painfully understanding, whispered through his mind and he was shifting the cigarette to the corner of his mouth, leaning forward and reaching for the pad of stationary in front of him.

 _I write letters_.

Javier found a pen that had rolled off his coffee table, grunted quietly as he reached for it, clicking it and trying a spiral or two, squinted in the darkness until he was sure it was flowing before ripping the page off and crumpling it. Pulling the pad of paper onto his lap, he angled himself toward the window so he could catch what meagre light he could…and began to write.

_Who do you write to?_

_My friends and family, to the people I love._

He couldn’t craft words like a poet or a politician, knew only the words he needed to say, blunt and decisive, a line in the sand. His hand began to cramp as he slowly filled the page with words, gripping it tightly enough that it made him wince, creating divots in the fragile paper but he didn’t care.

With each glide of the pen, each word that said clear as day that he loved the man in his bed, that it both killed him and warmed him, the chaotic energy slipped away, the knot of anxiety in his chest loosened and his breath came easier.

Javier sat there for a long time and when he was done, he didn’t read over the words, didn’t bother checking to see how much was in Spanish and how much in English, he just set the paper down on the table and breathed a sigh of relief.

Tearing it from the pad, he stuffed the paper unceremoniously into the cushions of the couch, knew he’d drag it out in the morning and probably toss it but for now, it was a small comfort that he would indulge in.

His cigarette had been put out awhile ago, so he stood and stretched, made his way back to the bedroom and didn’t feel overwhelmed by the sight of Steve lying there anymore. Climbing in next to him, Javier’s lips twitched into an easy smile as his partner immediately shifted closer, face being tucked in his shoulder, words muttered under his breath.

_I write letters to my friends and family, but I never send them._


End file.
